Letter of the Week – “Oh my god can I hear what I am missing on all of the other nonsense.”

More Hot Stamper Pressings of Albums with Stevie Nicks Performing

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently: 

Hey Tom,   

Well one thing I know for sure is the record matters A LOT. I have a handful of White Hots and oh my god can I hear what I am missing on all of the other nonsense. Even my Super Hots beat all of my other average stuff.

For example, my White Hot of Bella Donna is so far over the top of sounding like she is heard in the room that it’s scary. Same with my Bob Marley and Tom Petty. But I’m guessing they could be even better. I’m gonna update my cartridge and phono amp soon.

I noted:

The problem with audio systems is that you are always flying blind, never knowing what you are missing until you hear it.

Again, more evidence to support the popularity of mediocre Heavy Vinyl.

TP

He added:

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Dire Straits / Alchemy: Dire Straits Live

More of the Music of Dire Straits

  • An Alchemy like you’ve never heard, with solid Double Plus (A++) sound on all FOUR sides – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • The overall sonics here are big, rich and musical with great space and energy – just right for a live album
  • Stick with the imports on this title, even though the domestic pressings were originally mastered by Robert Ludwig – he didn’t have the real tapes, and that makes all the difference in the world
  • “The arena-size crowd cheers wildly, and claps and sings along when given half a chance, as though each song were an up-tempo rocker… That Dire Straits’ introspective music loses much of its detail in a live setting matters less than that it gains presence and a sense of anticipation.”

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Aerosmith – Toys in the Attic

More of the Music of Aerosmith

  • An excellent copy of Aerosmith’s 1975 down-and-dirty blues-rock hit release with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or close to it from start to finish
  • Our favorite Aerosmith album in every way, and a true Must Own for fans of the band
  • We guarantee there is dramatically more Tubey Magic, size and rock and roll energy on this vintage copy than others you’ve heard (particularly on side one), and that’s especially true of whatever dead-as-a-doornail Heavy Vinyl disaster is out there now
  • This is one of only a handful of copies we’ve been able to offer in over a year, but once you drop the needle on “Walk This Way” you’ll hear it was worth the wait – it rocks like it’s never rocked before
  • 5 stars: “Aerosmith finally perfected their mix of Stonesy raunch and Zeppelin-esque riffing with their third album. The success of the album derives from a combination of an increased sense of songwriting skills and purpose.”

If you’re looking for great sound for this fun album, you’ve come to the right place. This is raw, down-and-dirty blues-rock in the tradition of the Stones and the Faces, and when it sounds this good it sure is a blast to listen to.

I never really cared much for this band until many years ag when I heard “Sweet Emotion” on my local classic rock station (The Octopus) and realized that it would probably sound pretty amazing on a Hot Stamper vinyl version. Boy, was I right! It took quite a few copies and a whole lot of work, but the best sounding tracks on this album sound amazing. “Sweet Emotion” and “Walk This Way” are going to rock like they have never rocked before.

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Oscar Peterson + Clark Terry – Oscar Peterson Trio + One

More of the Music of Oscar Peterson

  • Amazing sound throughout this vintage pressing, with both sides earning INSANELY GOOD Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Rich, solid bass; you-are-there immediacy; energy and drive; instruments that are positively jumping out of the speakers – add it all up and you can see that this copy had the sound we were looking for
  • 5 stars: “Some guest soloists get overshadowed by Oscar Peterson’s technical prowess, while others meet him halfway with fireworks of their own; trumpeter Clark Terry lands in the latter camp on this fine 1964 session. With drummer Ed Thigpen and bassist Ray Brown providing solid support, the two soloists come off as intimate friends over the course of the album’s ten ballad and blues numbers.”

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Carly Simon – No Secrets

More of the Music of Carly Simon

  • An early Elektra pressing of Carly Simon’s classic 1972 album with seriously good sound from start to finish
  • Warm, sweet, rich, present and full-bodied, with much less strain on the vocals than a lot of the other copies we played
  • “You’re So Vain” was the big hit off of this one, a classic Richard Perry production with huge size and space
  • Five weeks at Number One and 4 1/2 stars on Allmusic, “. . . it wasn’t only Simon’s forthrightness that made the album work; it was also Richard Perry’s simple, elegant pop/rock production, which gave Simon’s music a buoyancy it previously lacked. “
  • If you’re a Carly Simon fan, this title from 1972 is probably her best album, and for non-fans, a good place to start

No Secrets is a bit of a tough nut to crack. Due to the mixture of folky pop songs, big production numbers and potential AM radio hit singles, it has to be cut just right to get every track to sound the way the artists (Carly Simon and studio cats), producer (Richard Perry) and engineers (Robin Geoffrey Cable and Bill Schnee) intended.

Balance is key to getting all the tracks to sound their best. Many copies we played were too dull or too bright, but the tonality here is Right On The Money. The clarity and detail are superb; just listen to Embrace Me, You Child on side two — you can really hear the rosiny texture of the strings as they are bowed.

The best copies such as this one are always transparent, natural and musical. The top end is wonderfully extended, balancing a BIG bottom end with lots of deep, well-defined bass. The drums are punchy and dynamic and the cymbals can sound amazing — just listen to how extended the crashes are on You’re So Vain on side one.

One more note: having your VTA set just right is critical to getting the best out of this album. The loudest vocal parts can easily strain otherwise. Once you get your settings dialed in correctly, a copy like this will have the kind of rich, sweet sound that is obviously the right one for this music.

We’re big fans of Another Passenger, the album she cut in 1976 with Ted Templeman producing. If you like Carly, you should definitely check that one out. (more…)

Art Pepper / One September Afternoon

More of the Music of Art Pepper

  • One September Afternoon returns to the site for the first time in years, here with STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sonics throughout this original Galaxy pressing – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Both of these sides are exceptionally full and spacious, with much more energy and dynamics than on all other copies we played
  • Pepper’s saxophone sound is right on the money – breathy and airy with clearly audible leading edge transients
  • “When Art Pepper died at the age of 56, he had attained his goal of becoming the world’s great altoist.” – AMG

This is an excellent recording from 1981, one of the best of the later Art Pepper period during which Art was signed with Galaxy and was devoting his remaining years to playing and recording as much as possible. The album is engineered by Baker Bigsby, as is Art Pepper Today (1978), my personal favorite Art Pepper album and amazing sounding if you can find the right pressing (we’re working on it!).

Like other Bigsby engineered titles, when you get a killer copy the bass is big, solid and it goes deep.

There are a lot of stinkers in the Art Pepper catalog from this era. (Acoustic Sounds released a few of them on 180 gram LPs as a matter of fact. What a waste of vinyl.)

But this album is actually quite good. Art plays in an energetic style, and Stanley Cowell on the piano is excellent as well.

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VTA – A Few Moments of Experimentation Can Really Pay Off

Basic Audio Advice — These Are the Fundamentals of Good Sound

Here we discuss what to listen for as you critically adjust your VTA.

While experimenting with the VTA for this record, we found a precise point where it all came together, far beyond whatever expectations we might have had for the sound at the time.

Practically out of nowhere we heard a solid, full-bodied, palpable violin that appeared to be floating between the speakers, an effect that, speaking for myself as a lifelong, obsessive audiophile — I fully appreciated for the magic trick that it is.

The sound of the wood of the instrument became so clear, the harmonic textures so natural, it was quite a shock to hear a good record somehow become an amazing one.

And all it took was a few moments of experimentation.

With the right VTA setting we immediately heard more harmonic detail, achieved, as is often not the case, with no sacrifice in richness.

That’s the clearest sign that your setup is right, or very close to it.

By the way, Robert Brook can get your front end tuned up and working right. We highly recommend his new service. It might just put you on the path to achieving the next level in audio. (You will definitely struggle to get there with a table, arm and cartridge that aren’t set up with a high degree of precision by a person who knows what they are doing, and Robert has been doing this work for years now.)
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Otis Redding – Good To Me / Live at the Whisky A Go Go Volume 2

Hot Stamper Pressings of Soul, Blues, R&B, etc. Available Now

This Stax British Import is a Better Records highly recommended recording. If I had to choose one Otis Redding record to keep, this would be the one! As good as his studio albums are, the guy was MAGICAL live.

If you’re an Otis Redding fan, this live album released in 1992 surely belongs in your collection.

The complete list of titles from 1992 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

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How Do the Early Pressings of this Mozart Piano Concerto Album Sound?

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Mozart Available Now

About fifteen years ago (2010) we played an original pressing of this title that we really liked. It’s the one with the rare cover you see pictured, and might have actually been the first one we had ever found in audiophile playing condition. We had a devil of a time finding more copies, but we were convinced that the early pressings were clearly the best.

More recently we were able to acquire quite a variety of different pressings for an upcoming shootout and were fortunate to be able to include one of the stereo originals for the first time in many years.

We started out with high hopes, but once the early pressing began to play, our hopes were dashed fairly quickly.

Our notes for the original pressing read:

  • Overly rich and weighty
  • Dynamics/life are gone.
  • Side two has one of the most boomy sounding pianos I’ve ever heard.

In other words, it just sounded like an old record, and not a very good one at that. The world is full of them.

Only an old school audio system can hide the faults of a pressing such as this one. The world is full of those too, even though they might comprise all the latest and most expensive components.

Were we wrong years ago? Hard to say. That copy from many years ago is gone.

Three things we always keep in mind when a pressing doesn’t sound the way we remember it did, or think it should:

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Dexter Gordon – Our Man In Paris

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Saxophone

 

  • Both sides of this vintage RVG-mastered Blue Note pressing earned solid Double Plus (A++) grades or BETTER on this Dexter Gordon classic from 1963 – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • The sound of the saxophone is so full-bodied and Tubey Magical you won’t believe it – where is that sound today?
  • The top opens up nicely and there is plenty of space in the studio, giving all the players room to breathe
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Gordon is at the very top of his game here. His playing is crisp, tight, and full of playful fury. Powell, who at this stage of his life was almost continually plagued by personal problems, never sounded better than he does in this session.”

The sound here is lively and energetic with plenty of low end weight. These sides have the whomp that you don’t hear on too many Blue Note LPs! The sound of the saxophone is captured beautifully — it’s breathy with clearly audible leading-edge transients.

The bluesy version of “Willow Weep For Me” on side one is wonderful. “Scrapple From The Apple” (also on side one) has a silky top end anchored by deep, well-defined bass.

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